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Tell us about your music career, band name, musical background, experience and skills.

Janko Raseta – classical guitarist with over 30 awards in the field. Composer of solo, chamber and orchestral pieces, film music. Producer in genres from pop and rock to hip-hop and deep house. Session guitarist.

Christopher Chlupacek – vocalist and lyricist, plays guitar, bass and recorder (flute). Founding member of his current solo project Matija.

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Tell us about your genre, concept and idea behind your music video and the song.

We hear a lot, that our music tends to sound like the pop music from the 80’s. We both love it, though it is not a deliberate concept behind it. We simply write what we like and what pleases us. We often allow ourselves to include elements in our music that would be typically discarded in modern musical production – longer solos or rather unusual chord progressions. From our experience, there are still people, who dig these.

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Tell us how to run a record label independently and successfully based on your experience as an artist.

As Aggressive Swans we don’t have a label at the moment. We bring out our music on our own. It speeds up the whole process significantly and leaves us lots of artistic freedom. The obvious downside is lack of potential financial support. We both are professional musicians though, involved in several projects. We produce music on our own, which cuts down the costs.

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Tell us how you are promoting your music.

We have a network of friends in clubs and local radio stations, who are always happy to support our new musical ventures. Besides, we reach music blogs through Submithub.

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Tell us what makes you happy and what makes you sad.

The obvious source of happiness is music, being the reason for doing Aggressive Swans in the first place. We get sad hearing about huge dramas of contemporary world: poverty, war, hunger, but also less significant problems involving music business nowadays.

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Explain clearly the story or concept behind the song.

“About You” tries to address the contemporary Weltschmerz of young people – finding their own place in the society, looking for acceptance, approval. Although quite specific, lyrics can be interpreted in an abstract way. At the same time, musical side of the song counterpoints the lyrics with its rather happy and upbeat mood.

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List the radio stations, TV stations and blogs that have aired or featured your new song.

Chris Stöger – drums – Keller Steff Band, Xavier Darcy, MarieMarie

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Tell us how long you have been in the music industry, your experience and your future goal.

Janko started playing guitar at the age of 7. Since 2013 he also produces and collaborates with various projects beyond classical music.

Chris plays recorder since his early years, often visiting master classes with prominent recorder players, like Maurice Steger. He is the founding member of the band Matija (formerly The Capitols).

We hope to continue our musical journey with Aggressive Swans in a way that pleases us most.

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Tell us what makes you unique from others.

We believe the huge difference is that we don’t try to be purposefully commercial.

We put the music in the first place. Although we spend very little time on Aggressive Swans, we always try to give our best.

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Tell us your weakness and strength pertaining music.

That would be both: playing as duo. It limits our live performance to some degree. Having a live drummer or a keys player allows way more freedom in musical expression. On the other hand though, it makes one sound different and traveling is a bliss.

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List your five favourite songs including the artists.

At the moment that would be:

Lonely Night – The Weeknd

Reflektor – Arcade Fire

Jupiter – Benjamin Clementine

Ti Amo – Phoenix

Illuminate – Orbital

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Tell us your position on “DIY” Do It Yourself” and signing to a major label.

DIY is our current situation with Aggressive Swans. We would be happy to receive help from a label, as long as it leaves us enough artistic freedom to pursue our ideas.

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Tell us the instruments put together in this song.

Guitars are Duesenberg Caribou and Japanese Paisley Tele through various effects and amps. Synths are mostly Roland Juno. We used a mixture of drum samples of our choice.

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Tell us other activities you will like to pursue apart from music.

That would be definitely cooking, for both of us.

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Tell us about gaining the confidence to sing in front of a large crowd for the first time.

The “first time” for us both was so long ago, that we can’t really recall it, but if anybody is stressed before his first show, we can definitely say, that it only gets better.

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Tell us the best way to make money in the music business.

Keep it simple and invest lots of cash – exactly the opposite of what we are doing here!

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Tell us your experience pertaining TV/Radio plugging.

As for now, we relied on our personal connections only. We’re looking forward to our next releases.

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Narrate your recording experience.

Since we share our time between different musical projects, we had to record “About You” in several stages. All recording was done at home or in a rehearsal room. We started with the basic instrumental, then added vocals. In the end came synths and sound effects/editing.